We were living in Ithaca, NY in 1961. I was in 5th grade. That was when I got my very first political lesson. Dad and his buddies one Saturday afternoon were at the house barbecuing burgers, drinking beer, and complaining about how all their NYS income tax payments flowed to NY City and the rest of the state got nothing.
A shame all the work is wasted on taxes to go to the shiftless.
Good time to remember the novel synopsis for Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged.
“Atlas Shrugged is a dystopian novel by Ayn Rand that argues that the mind is the source of all value and progress, and that society collapses when it stifles its most productive individuals through excessive regulation, taxation, and a culture that condemns self-interest. The novel’s central metaphor is that of the mythical giant Atlas, who is forced to hold up the sky, and the story’s “shrug” is when the nation’s “prime movers”—the creators and industrialists—go on strike, abandoning their businesses and disappearing.”